Chemistry: check! One test down (four more to go). We had our first test on Wednesday. I was a lot different that I expected it to be. I kind of felt like the material on the test was much deeper than what was taught in class. I'm not worried about my grade though. The teacher made the test worth half credit so that we could all get used to her testing style. Also, she blatently stressed that she gives partial credit, so put something down even on the multiple choice. I was actually feeling better about the test when I went in than when I went in (and shouldn't that be the other way around?!?!). I guess I will just study a little differently next time. I do like how the class is set up. We have five tests, each covering 2-3 chapters. The last test is the final and it is not comprehensive. That makes my day. After each chapter, Professor Modarelli ties the chapter into real life and gives us examples of chemistry in our lives. I like it a lot. The first two chapters were about gases, the greenhouse effect, and the ozone/global warming. We talked about things we could do, as well as watch a movie. The movie was sooooooo cute. It was called Arctic Tale, and followed a polar bear pup and a baby seal in the Arctic. It showed the detrimental affects of global warming. It wasn't a bad movie at all. Queen Latifa was the narrorator and it was producted by National Geographic. It really made me want to "save the world," although I felt pretty hopeless. I definitely realized how necessary it is for me to recycle each and every water bottle I use and turn the lights off as much as possible, especially when I'm not in the room.


My Family Tree
As I briefly mentioned before, I worked on my family tree for extra credit in the three week. I am forever greatful to Professor Pittman for the assignment. She didn't ask us to dig in very deep, however, it was just enough to spark an interest in me. I have spent the last month researching my family tree and I am having so much fun. I would suggest it to anyone. Atleast talk to your older family members. Find out what it was like for them growing up and any other stories they will tell you. Also, ask them to generate a list of names: the names of their parents, their aunts and uncles (and spouses and children), and their grandparents (as well as any other family they can remember). I have been working on My boyfriend's family tree a bit too. His great grandmother is still alive and I feel like it would be such a shame to let the family history die without talking to her about it. Sadly, when we went to see her, we found that the last year hadn't treated her so well and she wasn't that competent. My grandma is having a blast helping me figure things out. It is almost satisfying just to see how much fun she is having, and it is definitely building a new connection for us. I love hearing her stories about her and my grandpa. They were married for 52 years before he died and they had such a love. It is almost better than a great romance novel because it is real life and it is my grandparents. I realize I am not doing a family tree justice, but it is so very satisfying. I would suggest to anyone to do something with their family tree. I started on Ancestry.com, to which you can get a free 2 week trial membership. I also found I could go to my local library (the main branch) and they had a whole section of the library dedicated to genealogy. My library has all of the local newspapers back to the early 1900s, which is great for finding obituaries. I will let you know if I find any kings or someone important in my family history!

So much to catch up on!!!

Ok, I have not written in a long time and have a lot to catch up on. I'm going to go with the excuse that my computer at home was way to slow to use! That sounds good. I guess I will start with the things that happened before Christmas break. As you knew, my class was a new experience for me. It ended up being a really good one. I would definitely take the class over if I had the option and would recommend it to anyone. It was a growing experience for me. The class ended up having only one other white girl and the rest were African American. The class was really accepting of both the other girl and I. I felt very comfortable by the end and have no regret. The class was somewhat trying at times. The teacher was awesome, but she did give us a pretty heavy course load. We had 2-3 reading each night, and had to outline each one. During the last week, we had a make up class on Monday. This mean we had class from 1-4 and 6-9. Our final was only 2 days later and our study guide was like 6 pages. I felt the stress for sure. Professor Pittman would like to teach the class in the twelve week, and I don't think she would have to add any more material and would still keep a twelve week class busy. By the time I was done with the final, I didn't want to even talk about the material for another moment.

Christmas Dinner

Did you know that Hiram puts on a Christmas dinner for the students? Probably not since I didn't even know until the day before. The upperclassmen started talking about it and saying it would be the best food we would get for a long time. The dinner was the week before break. It was in the Kennedy center. My roommate, a few other people, and I went over to eat. We walked into the main level and it was gorgeous!! There were huge tables, some had lots of fruit cut up, and the others were filled with cheese and crackers. The main table had some sort of meatballs (I'm a vegetarian), artichoke dip, Brie cheese stuff and maybe something else I can't remember. The desert room was something else. It was like 9 tables of the best deserts ever. They had things like rich chocolate deserts and peanut butter pies. As completely impressed as I was, I was somewhat disappointed. I felt like the meal was huge, but didn't have any real food, just hor' dourves. We sat around enjoying ourselves and talked for a while. Just about when we were full, we heard someone mention the food upstairs. Turns out, we had enjoyed only the appetizers and deserts, and confused it for the whole meal. We venture upstairs to find a Christmas *feast*. They had roast and turkey, both at one of those tables they slice for you. They had chicken, salad, pasta salad, and honestly, the buffet with the most options I have ever seen at a buffet. I really wished that we had know that was more food upstairs. Needless to say, we left very full!!

Kwanza

During the last week of school, there was a Kwanza dinner for the students. We needed to get a ticket ahead of time, although the tickets were free. I had no idea what Kwanza was, which was somewhat ignorant of me. One of my friends Simone asked me to go with her. She had an extra ticket since her roommate couldn't attend due to scheduling conflicts. We got dressed up and wandered down to the Coleman center, which was also decorated to a "T". What I didn't know was that Kwanza was an African American holiday celebrated at the end of the year to be thankful for everything they have been blessed with. I walked in and found that my whole three-week class was there, that two of the students had planned the whole thing, and my teacher was the mistress of the ceremony! I had such a great time. Various students took turns reading and doing performances pertaining to each of the seven days of Kwanza. I found out another girl in my class, Isabella, had a phenomenal voice. The food was once again, out of this world. It was all catered, and even with smaller than normal portions, I couldn't fit everything on my plate! They had a great feast also, although I can't recall the menu for you item by item because it was well over a month ago. But I'll try so here goes: corn bread, mac and cheese, green beans, turkey, greens, corn, etc. It was a great cultural experience for me and I was very thankful for all the experiences that the last three weeks of the semester had given to me.

My Break

On more of a personal note, I had a great break, although I feel it was way too short. I enjoyed the time with my mom and by boyfriend Zak. I spent time working with my mom doing medical billing and coding. I went skiing at Peak'n Peek in NY with my family and had a great time watching my boyfriend and step brother learn to snow-board. Unfortunately, the second half of the day was rather rainy, and we were all soaked. I would have much rather had snow! One of my favorite things over the break was my time spend working on my family tree. It all started in my three week class. For four extra credit points, we could begin our family tree and go back about three generations on one side of our family. I went to my grandma and we spent a whole Saturday going through a box of obituaries and funeral announcement card thingies. She also pulled out some old pictures, like a family picture from 1911 of my grandma's great grandparents and their 8 children. From there I signed up for ancestry.com's free 14 day trial. I have had so much fun! I am addicted! I love ancestry because I can get the old census records. My grandma loves that I am interested and has found so many various papers such as marriage license, birth certificates, death certificates, baptismal certificates, christening records, war enlistment papers, etc. My mom and I found out that our local library has a whole genealogy section. They have every issue of our local newspaper back to the early 1900s. I am not doing this project justice. I would suggest this to anyone. It is fun and very satisfying. If nothing else, I encourage anyone to at least talk to your grandparents, great grandparents, parents, or other older relatives. Ask them about their parents, grandparents and their spouses and brother and sisters. Write it down. Write down any other names they remember. Also ask where these people lived, at least the state. Next I think is the part that is more fun. Ask them to tell you stories of their childhood and of these people. I found some stories that are funny, sad, and everything in between.

My Spring Classes

Wow this sounds weird, but writing the word "spring" right now just send a wave of refreshment over me. I was kind of dreading coming back, but my mom really helped me cheer up and see the positive things. I love the college, I was just hard to come back after a break at home. It wasn't so bad after I got here. It was nice and I was soon back into the swing of things. I woke up ten minutes before my 7 am alarm, which made me happy because I was scared I wouldn't be able to wake up. I have Chem II, Physics II, my freshman seminar the Philosophy of Love and Friendship, and I will have some kind of ethics class during the three week, but I'll talk about that when it comes. I am debating about another class, an independent study with the teacher from my fall three week class, Professor Pittman. I really want to work with her on her dissertation work, but I'm not sure if I want to put even one more thing on my plate right now.

As always, If you have any questions, feel free to ask me by posting them.

Spoiled

Professor Pittman is one of the most involved and caring professors I have ever had. She is such a sweetie. Everyday she sets up a little goodie table for us. She knows that colds are going around, so she brings cough drops, tissues, purrell, lotion, candy, and even drinks. She brings a random assortment of drinks for us everyday such as bottles of coke, vitamin water, orange juice, even starbucks drinks!!! Tonight we are having a pizza party. For extra credit, we can work on our family tree during the three weeks. We need to get back to the turn of the century on one side. She is going to give us an overview of how she would like it done and some useful resources tonight, and is bring pizza. I am really glad I am in the class. It has been a positive experience for me. It is not a time to slack in any way. We were reminded that missing one day of class is equivalent to missing one week's worth of class in a twelve week. We have two or three readings every night and we have to take notes on them that will be graded at the end. I am enjoying the material a lot. I am thinking about the dynamics of African American Families today in a way I never thought of them before. The enslavement of African Americans in the past, and their treatment even after they were freed, has left a lasting legcy. A few things we have considered are the involvement of the mother versus the father in child rearing. During slavery and reconstruction, it was not easy for a father to be involved. Did you know that during slavery, slave owners didn't even recognize any type of relationship or connection between a father and children? ...that a slave family was a mother and children? ...that it was perfectly fine to sell a father away from his family, or even a mother separate from the children? The class is long at times, but never dull. Either the teacher or other students are constantly interjecting personal stories or jokes. We have taken so many notes!!!! We have to take notes (that will be graded) on every lecture, movie, presentation by other students, and article we read because they are all fair game for our mid-term or final. Anyway it is time for pizza so I will write more later!

First day of the three week

Today was my first day of the three week class. The class I am taking is Sociology of Black Families. I chose the class because a.) it would count toward my biomedical humanities requirements and b.) my advisor said it would be good for me to consider the life structure of people different than me especially if I plan on going into the medical field. This made sense, not everyone I expect to treat as someone in the medical field will come from the same background as me. I assumed most of the people in the class would be there for the same reason I was, they were recruited to expose themselves to different cultures as it would be pertinant to their future careers. This is not what I found on the first day of class. I realized I was one of three white students in the class. I was not sure what to think at first, because this was a different setting than I had ever been in before. I wasn't sure what to do, continue with the class or drop it. It probably took me about an hour to get back in my comfort zone, and by the end of the three hour class I knew I was not going to drop it. Everyone in the class was very open minded and friendly. The girls were very welcoming and I didn't feel like and outsider. The teacher assigned us "families" that we will work on our two presentations with. I am in a group with Nikita and Rob, and I think we will make a great "family." The teacher is LaShawnDa Pittman, who is here through a fellowship while she works on her Ph.D in Sociology through Northwestern. She is really friendly and seems like she will be a good teacher. I will keep you updated on my progress in the class.

60.72%

What does 60.72% mean? Well I will tell you. This is finals week, and is obviously stressful. My mom sent me a note with lots of goodies, including a magazine clipping that says "60.72% is the difference in salary between someone with a bachelor's degree and someone with a high school diploma (the Bureau of labor and statistics fall 2005)."



Hiram has very unique semesters. A normal semester is 15 weeks, and a typical load would be about 4 classes. At Hiram, the semester is broken into two parts: a 12 week component in which we take 3 classes, and a 3 week component where we take 1 class. The twelve week ends before thanksgiving break and spring break. This mean it is almost impossible to have any assignments over break, literally, because you are between classes. Our finals started on Sunday afternoon and will go through Tuesday. Then we will be off until next Wednesday. Finals are very stressful!! I have been cramming for about a week now. In chemistry we had a test on chapters 6-9 on Friday, and then today we had the final on all the chapters (1-9). John Andrews is my teacher and he is very good! I promise you. It is hard work, but it is well worth it. If i had it to do over, I would still take his class. I am hoping it will help me as I continue toward a science degree. Another professor I would suggest is Joseph Gallant for physics. He is new to Hiram but has a great sense of humor and is very realistic about his expectations. All of my teachers seem to have been realistic about the finals. They all realized that we have other finals and tried to make it as bearable as possible. My cumulative math final was turned into a take home test. Don't think I got off the hook too much because it still took a little over five hours!!! My room mate has a paper that is due tomorrow, and just a few hours ago she got an email from the teacher giving them a week extension. I have heard a few stories of hard teachers; I'm sure we have our share. I heard we have a new psychology teacher that has a pretty high standard. One of my friends, Ben, has an intense calculus class. For each test they take, they have a retake the following day where they can get up to half of the points back that they missed during the first try. Well on the final, the highest grade was a 55%, but they still get their retake. Where every you go, you just have to study and you will be fine! At any rate, I am off to study Physics. Tomorrow after 11 am I will be homeward bound for a week! Happy Thanksgiving!

Yet again, the professors shine through!!

I am taking a one credit hour class entitled Cancer and the Arts. It has been a great class. Last night was our last night. I was going to stay after class and talk to the professor - Jon Moody - about possibly picking up an ethics minor. I heard him ask a few other students to stay after. When everyone left I saw that it was our four international students he asked to say. He asked each one if they had somewhere to go for Thanksgiving. He didn't let them off the hook with just a yes answer. He went through the whole, "are you sure?" "Where are you going?" set of questions. He said he has extra room at his dinner table and he wanted to make sure everyone had somewhere to go. I thought that was one of the sweetest things. Oh, and did I mention that he also went home before class to bake us delicious brownies?? Well, he did.

A college full of awesome professors.

So yesterday I was studying for my statistics test with two other girls. We weren't really getting anywhere so we decided to go to the Professor for help. She, like every other teacher, always encourages us to come by, especially before a test. She also told us to wait for a few minutes if she isn't there because she went to get food. Well, she wasn't there. We decided to sit outside of her office and wait. Brad Gubser, the other math teacher, walked by and told us that our teacher had gone home. He then told us he knew we had a test tomorrow and asked us if we had any questions. We had a lot! He had two meetings in the next two hours, and he insisted on moving the second one to help us, even though he wasn't our teacher. We tried to say it was ok, we didn't want to make him move meetings. He helped us for an hour, and went over both chapters. I was so amazed that someone who wasn't even our teacher rearranged his schedule to help us!!! To top it off, he sent us an email the next day asking us how we did. I am really impressed with all of the professors I have come across so far at Hiram. They all seem to go above and beyond. They are very supportive of the students and have a very, very open door policy. One more example. My chemistry teacher, the guy with the great British accent, invited all of the chemistry students to his house yesterday for dinner. Every year, him and his wife host a dinner. They live right here in Hiram, basically on campus. He said we were more than welcome to come in our Halloween costumes since it was only the day after Halloween. I walked in with my friends, and every room in the lower level of the house was packed with students. His wife made wonderful food and about four types of deserts. Professor Andrews told us all about the food: they had beef tips (or something, I don't eat meat so I don't remember exactly what it was), rice and curry for the vegetarians, and an organic salad. They also had cucumbers in dill and something else (very delicious!). The science students and teachers hung out for a while. I couldn't believe how relaxed the night was, and how comfortable I was in my professor's house. When it was time to go, we went up to his bedroom and got our coats. It felt more like I was in the house of one of my parents' or grandparents' homes, not a professor. We really do have amazing professors here at Hiram.